


Ruby Rose, Adorable Thief TM

by jaztice



Category: RWBY
Genre: Fluff, Normal AU, POV First Person, Pickpockets, Poverty, aka the era of paperboys and industrialization and rampant poverty and foreign immigration, aka the gilded age, anyway, basically this is fluff between Qrow and Ruby bc i felt like it, because i suck and needed an excuse for ruby to be a pickpocket, can you tell im a history nerd, enjoy, except it's only normal in that no one has powers and the grimm don't exist, fun times right, it's also set in like, late 19th century America, maybe some angst but you kinda have to squint, oh and yang and ruby's parents are dead, okay back to the point
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-23
Updated: 2016-01-23
Packaged: 2018-05-15 17:55:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5794195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaztice/pseuds/jaztice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ruby Rose is ten years old and the best pickpocket this side of Vale. Her parents died three years ago, and now she and her sister Yang live on the streets and somehow manage to scrape by. And everything was actually going pretty smoothly! Well, that is, until Ruby decided to steal from the drunkest man she'd ever seen in her entire life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ruby Rose, Adorable Thief TM

Yang hadn’t been able to catch a fight in the Club for a few days, and I was really starting to get hungry. Usually, those fights gave us enough money to feed ourselves for a day or two, even if Yang lost – which she almost never did, my sister was awesome – but the new guy at the club didn’t like letting kids fight anymore. Said it was “bad for business” or something. The point is, Yang couldn’t fight anymore, we didn’t have any money, and I was hungry. Which is why I decided to go pickpocket in the market.

I don’t actually have to be hungry to go pickpocketing, really, but at least it’s kind of a valid excuse. Actually, I’m _really good_ at it – almost as good as Yang is at fighting! I’m only ten and really small, but no one suspects an adorable little girl of being a thief. At least, that’s what Yang says. Torchwick has been trying to get me to join his thieving gang for a long time, but I don’t really like him, and neither does Yang. He kills people.

But really, me being hungry was the main reason I was out in the market in the middle of the day. Around this time of year, the cold usually kept me off the streets and inside our little hideout, but I hadn’t eaten in a few days. Plus, I had no shoes. I needed money.

The market, thankfully, was still pretty busy even in the cold. Busy and cold were actually really good for me; with both of those in play, no one would notice me trying to steal their wallets.

I peeked out from behind a wall, tugging my ragged and faded red cloak around me to try and keep from freezing. About half the people in this district were really well off, so I didn’t feel to bad about stealing from them. A lot of them had fur coats and fancy clothes on, the wind trying to dislodge their perfect hair and sparkling jewelry. But it’s not like I stuck out – other people milled about with them wearing moth eaten coats and muddy boots and any other assortment of rags. The market was the one place in the city where all the different classes mingled.

“Get out of here, you stinkin’ rat!” someone yelled across the street. A second later, a man with black spikey hair was shoved out of Randy’s Pub and fell into the pile of empty crates sitting on the road. Randy the bartender slammed the door as the guy started clamoring to his feet, crates clattering to the ground.

“Yeah, you better run!” he yelled, his voice slurred as he grabbed onto a streetlamp to keep from falling over. “Damn pansy! I’ll fight everyone in there, just you watch!”

 _Wow,_ I thought, _he’s already drunk? It’s not even noon!_

I was a little concerned, but as I kept watching him, that concern started to fade. I could see now that the man had on really nice clothes, like, nice enough to be either upper class or a con man. He even had a maroon cloak! This guy was obviously rich enough to have money.

And stealing from a drunk guy was like taking candy from a baby. Which is something I would never do! Unless I was starving and the baby was super rich or something. Then it’s different.

The spikey haired guy rubbed his head and walked into the market, swaying a little but not nearly as much as I’d thought he would. He walked up to the fruit stand and started looking at apples, pulling a wallet out of his pocket as he did so.

 _Bingo,_ I thought. After he bought the apples, he’d put the wallet back in his pocket, and then I’d slip it out and be home free. Dinner for everyone. I might even be able to buy a pair of shoes!

“Drunk already, Branwen?” the man behind the stand asked as he examined his apples.

“Nah,” the guy – Branwen – answered. “Just hung over. Everyone knows the best way to cure a hangover is to drink more, right?”

The fruit vendor just shook his head. “One of these days, you’re gonna kill yourself.”

Mister Drunk Off His Ass winked and replied, “That’s the idea, Greg. How much for three?”

“Two lien.”

“Done.”

The two men exchanged wares, the drunk guy slipping the apples into a pouch on his belt and his wallet into his pocket again. As he left, I snuck up behind him and tried to look as innocent and inconspicuous as possible.

 _Quick and quiet,_ I thought, slipping my hand into his pocket. _Quick and quiet, Ruby._

It went just as smoothly as I planned. But as soon as I pulled the wallet out, the Drunken Glory decided to trip over a cobblestone and nearly took me with him.

“Whoa!” he yelled, and I shouted in surprise and caught his arm, still holding his wallet in my hand.

 _Put it away, put it away, put it away,_ I kept thinking. _Put it away before he sees._ But the man was upright before I had the time, so I just slipped both hands behind my back.

“Are you okay?” I asked, trying to sound concerned. It wasn’t hard – this guy might get run over by a carriage before he even made it home the way he was going.

The guy blinked and looked down at me, and I realized that his eyes were red. Not red like bloodshot, but like his actual eyes were red. They surprised me a little – the only other person I knew with red eyes was Yang, and she only had one red eye. Her other one was lilac.

“Me?” the guy asked, and suddenly he was grinning. “Oh yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for catching me there, kid.”

I grinned and nodded back before he turned and began walking away, rubbing the back of his head as he reached into his pouch to grab an apple. His wallet was still in my hands, the brown leather soft under my fingers as I brought it out from behind my back.

“Nice, Ruby,” I whispered to myself, turning around and starting to head back to the hideout. I flipped open the pouch on my belt and put the wallet in there, snapping it shut again as soon as I did.

“Hey!”

I whipped around and saw the drunk spikey head staring at me, his hand next to his pocket. He looked pissed.

 _Aw crap,_ I thought.

The guy started running for me, and I turned and sprinted away as fast as my legs could carry me.

* * *

There are three important things to be when you’re a pickpocket. Number one is observant – you have to know where people keep their valuables. Number two is smooth, both in how you move and how you act. No one suspects someone confident of being a thief, and no one can feel when you steal from them if you’re nimble enough.

Number three? That’s being fast.

I’d always been fast, even when I was small. Yang had always been bigger and stronger than me, but I was always faster. When our parents were around, I was the best at tag; when they died, I was the best at running from cops. Older boys used to race me when I was little, and I’d make them pay me if I beat them – Yang would make sure they paid up every time I did. It was kind of my claim to fame.

Except this guy was pretty fast too.

I knew the back alleys around here like the back of my hand, but this guy was too fast for me to lose him. Who even was he? He ran like an Olympic sprinter, and he was _drunk!_

“Get back here!” he yelled, but I was just far enough ahead for him not to reach me. I slid under a broken street lamp and turned a corner, catching sight of him leap over it behind me. Oh god, I had to lose this guy. If he brought me to the cops, Yang wouldn’t be able to save me!

I could hear people up ahead, and my hope grew. Loosing people in crowds was always easy, especially since I was so small. All I had to do was dodge through legs and hide somewhere!

“Stop!” the man yelled again. I turned and stuck my tongue out at him just before jumping into a mass of people in the marketplace, slipping through the crowd with ease. I could hear him yelling for someone to stop me, but no one did. No one cared.

As soon as I was out of his sight, I slipped into another alley and pressed my back against the wall, chest heaving. God, it’d been a while since I’d had to run like that. I was totally out of breath. And my feet were hurting a lot, or, well, as much as they could hurt what with them being almost completely numb and all.

The wind ripped right through my clothes, but I was only just now starting to feel the cold. Every breath I took felt like icicles stabbing the inside of my lungs. But I’d done it! I had his wallet, I had his money, and now I could actually buy myself some food! Honestly, at this point, I’d earned it.

I took another freezing deep breath and pushed myself off the wall, leaning around the corner to peek out into the street. The drunk guy was probably gone by this point, but I wanted to be sure. It’d be a real problem to escape him just to run into him while trying to buy bread or something.

Once I finally established that yes, Mister Drunk Guy was gone, I sighed in relief and turned around.

And found myself staring right into his face.

“Hi there,” he said with a grin.

I gasped in shock and tried to run, but he grabbed my arm and yanked me back before I could get anywhere. My heart started beating so fast it felt like I was having a heart attack.

 _Kick him in the shin!_ I thought. That’s what Yang always told me to do. So I tried that.

“Whoa, hey!” He jerked his leg out of the way and grabbed my other arm, kneeling down so he was at eye level with me. I kept struggling, my mind filled with panic.

“No, no, no, let me go!” I yelled, shaking my head. I kept thrashing around, but he was way stronger than me. Which shouldn’t be surprising, considering I was a starving ten-year-old, but that didn’t make me feel any better. I had to get away. I _had_ to. Yang would _kill_ me if I got stuck in jail! I would kill me!

“Hey, hey calm down!” the guy said, holding me in place. He didn’t sound angry, which surprised me. He sounded concerned, really, genuinely concerned. “It’s okay, alright? I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Let me go!” I shouted again, but I was too tired to struggle now, it was like all my energy was gone. Instead, I kept my head turned away and gritted my teeth, trying not to cry.

I _really_ didn’t want to go to jail. I didn’t. I was just hungry.

“Shh, hey,” he said, his grip loosening. “It’s okay, kid. Look at me.”

I glanced up at his face, my eyes blurring with tears. His eyes weren’t angry. Why wasn’t he angry?

“I’m not gonna hurt you, okay?” he told me. “I promise.”

I stared at him. He… wasn’t going to hurt me?

I searched his face for any trace of a lie, but there wasn’t one. All that did was confuse me more. I’d just stolen this guy’s wallet. Normal people told the police, or they chased after me screaming bloody murder, or they sent Junior’s men after me and Yang – that had only happened once, when I stole some really valuable jewelry. But no one was ever like… this. It was almost like he cared.

He paused for a moment, studying my face, before asking, “You have a name, kid?”

Another thing normal people didn’t do – ask for my name. I was starting to realize this guy wasn’t going to let me go for a while. But at least he wasn’t dragging me to the cops.

I sighed and stared at my feet, trying to wiggle my numb toes.

“Ruby,” I answered.

When I looked up, the guy was smiling. He didn’t look very scary at all when he smiled.

“Ruby, huh?” he said. “I’m Qrow. Nice to meet you. Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like my wallet back please.”

Qrow smelled like whiskey and smoke, but he didn’t seem that drunk at all. And he really did seem kind of nice. It’s not like I had much of a choice, though – he wouldn’t let me go unless I gave it back.

I chewed my lip and kept staring at the ground, feeling him let go of my arm as I reached into my belt pouch and pulled out his wallet. The leather was still soft – he’d had this wallet for a while. Trying not to think about all the food I could buy with the money in that wallet, I handed it back to him. Qrow smiled and took it, slipping it into his pocket and letting go of my other arm too.

 _I could run right now,_ I immediately thought, but something kept me in place. This Qrow guy was really weird, in a good way. No one except Yang had ever been this nice to me before, not after our parents died.

After he put his wallet away, Qrow looked back up and stared at my face, like he was studying me.

“Now tell me,” he said, placing one arm on his knee, “what’s a little girl like you doing stealing from people, huh? No family?”

I shrugged. My only family was Yang, but I wasn’t going to tell him that.

Qrow sighed. “How long has it been since you last ate?” he asked.

I shrugged again, wrapping my arms around my stomach, but it growled loudly anyway. Stupid stomach. I didn’t need its sass right now.

I felt my face turn red, but Qrow just grinned and reached into his belt pouch, pulling out one of the market apples. He offered it to me, and after deciding that yes, this might be somewhat suspicious but I was really too hungry to care, I snatched it out of his hand and bit into it.

I’m pretty sure I audibly whimpered when I tasted actual food again for the first time in two days. The rest of the apple was gone within a minute.

“Damn, that was fast,” Qrow said, grinning. “You sure know how to eat, don’t you?”

“Mmhm,” I nodded, a little more comfortable now. “Yang always says that I–”

I stopped mid-sentence, panicking. I’d just said _Yang’s name_. Now, if he wanted to, he could find her too! Nice going Ruby, you ruined it for everyone.

“Yang?” Qrow asked. “Who’s that?”

“No one,” I answered immediately. Qrow raised an eyebrow.

“No one?” he said. “Really?”

“I… She’s…” I tried to splutter out an excuse, but nothing would come out. Qrow gave me another weird look.

“Okay, fine,” I muttered. Too late to lie now. “She’s my sister, and she’s only two years older than me but she takes care of me because our parents are gone and she’s really, really great and I don’t want her to get in trouble because if you take me to the police they’re gonna ask me about her and I don’t want her to get caught too because she’s never really done anything bad and she’s always been super great to me and I don’t want to get her in trouble because I was being stupid and–”

“Whoa, whoa, slow down kid!” Qrow grabbed my shoulders and gave me a reassuring grin. “It’s okay, I’m not gonna turn you in to the cops.”

“Y-you… aren’t? Why not?”

“Because the cops in this part of town are idiots,” he answered, “and they’re more likely to beat you up than do anything else.”

“Oh.” I was surprised to hear him say that. “You know about that?”

“Of course I know, I’ve lived here for a while now.” Qrow winked at me. “What, did you think I was some kind of snot nosed blue blood because of my fancy clothes?”

“Well…” I shrugged. “Yeah.”

He laughed and shook his head, but a freezing cold wind whipped through the alley before he could say anything else. I immediately grabbed my cloak and wrapped it around me, teeth chattering uncontrollably as I bowed my head to avoid the wind. My cloak wasn’t even warm anymore, not with all the holes in it, but it was the only thing I had.

I heard Qrow move, and when I glanced up, I saw his arms near me again and flinched away. But he was just draping his own cloak over me, his face creased with concern.

The cloak was so _warm_ though. And it completely swallowed me up too, it was so big! Parts of it were dragging on the ground. Then Qrow pulled the hood over my head, and the wind tearing at my face was gone. I could barely even feel the cold through this thing!

I smiled and giggled, looking up at Qrow, and for a second his face went slack, staring at me but also right through me, his eyes wandering through space. Then the moment passed, and he grinned right back.

“Pretty warm now, huh?” he asked. I nodded and snuggled into his cloak, soaking up the warmth.

“Thanks, Qrow!” I said, smiling. Then my smile faded. “But aren’t you cold now?” I asked.

“Eh, I’m not the one wearing rags,” he replied with a shrug. “Besides, I’m going home now anyway. You wanna come?”

I tilted my head, staring at him suspiciously.

“Come… to your house?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

“I mean do you want to come live with me, squirt,” he said, rubbing my head. “I’ve got plenty of room at my place, and I’m sure it’d be better than sleeping out here on the streets. We can go get your sister too. You okay with that?”

“You…” I stared at him. “You want us to come live with you? But…”

“But I don’t even know you?” he finished with his signature grin. “Well…”

It sounded like he wanted to say something after that, but he stopped himself before he did. Instead, he turned back to me.

“Look, I swear I don’t have some evil ulterior motive, okay?” he said, his eyes meeting mine. “I don’t want to… do anything to you, I just don’t want you living out here with winter and snow coming. Either of you. Especially not when I have plenty to spare. I just want to help. Is that okay?”

I blinked, still kind of in shock about the whole _he wants us to come stay at his house with actual walls and heating and probably food, holy crap_ part of the conversation. This… just didn’t seem real. And Yang…

“I’m… I’m not sure,” I said slowly, trying to think. “It sounds great, but Yang may not want to. She um, she doesn’t really trust many people these days, and I can’t leave her alone, so if she says no…”

“I got it.” Qrow nodded in understanding, but I could see he was thinking. “Well, we should probably go meet her then, right? I’m just worried about you two.”

“We’ve been doing just fine for three years,” I answered, a little put off. “We don’t need someone to take care of us.”

“I know,” Qrow said heavily. “Trust me, I know. And I don’t intend to baby you or anything like that. I just don’t want you dying out here on the street when I could’ve helped you.”

I studied his face some more, watching his eyes. He really did seem genuine, especially about the not-babying-us part, and I could tell he did want to help us. But there was something he didn’t want to say, at least not right now. It wasn’t anything bad, I knew that, but it was a big part of him deciding to take us in. I just didn’t know what.

But Qrow was nice, really and truly nice, and that wasn’t something kids like Yang and I saw every day. And he was offering us a warm place to sleep, and beds and shoes and food, and honestly, I was still kind of hungry.

So I made my choice.

“Okay,” I said, looking at him in as serious a fashion I could muster. “I’ll take you to Yang. If she says yes, we’ll do it.”

Qrow blinked in surprise before a smile spread across his face.

“Alright,” he said, standing up, “let’s do this, squirt. Where’s Yang?”

“Probably back at our hideout now,” I answered, grabbing his hand. “Come on, I’ll show you!”

I pulled Qrow down the alley and pulled his cloak tight around me, leading him to Yang and I’s little hideout in the rough part of town. Part of me was a little scared Yang would say no, but I knew she wouldn’t after meeting Qrow. He seemed a lot like her, actually. They’d probably get along great, if Yang didn’t try to beat him up first.

Besides, I liked Qrow. He was nice, and he didn’t rat me out to the cops, and he let me wear his cloak. And he gave me an apple. If there was anyone I’d want to live with aside from Yang, it would be him.

I just hoped I’d find out what caused him to make the offer in the first place.


End file.
